1. Field
The present invention relates to a technology for determining a color of an outside and an inside of a three-dimensional object.
2. Description of Related Art
Recently, use of a three-dimensional (3D) printer is increasing, and, in particular, a 3D printer that can support multiple materials and colors is widely used. However, according to the conventional method of processing colors in a 3D printer or the conventional image file format that is input into a 3D printer, it is difficult to effectively output a 3D output product having multiple materials or multiple colors. For example, an STL file, which is the most frequently used in a 3D printer, includes only appearance information of a 3D object, so there is a difficulty in assigning material or color information to a 3D output product output according to the STL file.
In addition, U.S. Patent Registration Notification No. U.S. Pat. No. 7,991,498 suggests a technology for dividing the surface of a 3D object in units of cells, and assigning colors to the respective color cells. The method can assign colors to a 3D object that has a simple shape or a simple color, but has difficulty in being applied to a 3D object that has a complicated shape or various colors. According to the conventional technology, there is limitation in dividing the surface of a 3D object and assigning a color to each divided surface, and in particular, a 3D object having a complicated shape is subject to difficulty in elaborate color processing.